30.10.12

Pankaj Advani's decision to
withdraw from the International Championship and play in the World Professional
Billiards Championship paid dividends when he won the three ball world title in Leeds at the weekend.

It gave the wildcard, Zhou
Yuelong, a walkover to play Ding Junhui later today.

Zhou is just 14. He is of
course very much an outsider but is looking to join another 14 year-old, Lu
Haotian, in the last 16.

It stands to reason that
China will produce another world class player in the mould of Ding - surely
more than one - but it could be that it won't be any of the players currently
on tour but one of these talented teenagers.

There are many junior
tournaments in China and they are also getting their chance now against top
players in these raking tournaments. Many may feel the wildcard round is unfair
but this isn't the fault of the wildcards and they can't be blamed for making
the most of their opportunities.

I remember Ding himself
playing as a 14 year-old in the 2002 China Open in Shanghai, where he took two
frames off Mark Selby.

Many talented teenagers have
disappeared into the snooker ether over the years but there seems to be more a
structure in China to keep them on track.

It's clear many of them have
watched Judd Trump, who also plays later today, and want to emulate his all out
attacking style.

You have to be really,
really good to do this successfully but it's inconceivable that in a country
the size of China with so many snooker clubs and so much TV exposure that
someone won't emerge and become a major star.

On a general point about the
tournament, the increase to best of 11s seems to have reminded everyone just
what an important event this is.

It's been well supported and
has already produced some good matches, with a couple of shocks for good
measure.

Sport is at its best when
there's something at stake. There is in Chengdu and that's why it promises to
be such an interesting week.

28.10.12

Ryan
Day has quietly started to recover his world ranking and is 22nd on
the latest list.

He
was once as high as sixth but endured a poor run of form which left him
fighting to stay in the top 32.

Who
knows why form deteriorates? Sometimes there are off table reasons, usually
unknown to followers of the sport. Other times it’s just that confidence gets
dented by the odd close defeat and is hard to recover, even with so many
playing opportunities.

Day
is a very heavy scorer when he gets going. He is certainly good enough to have
won a ranking event without having quite done it. He has three defeats in
finals so far.

The
Welshman was a member of the original WPBSA young players of distinction scheme
in 2000, which also included Shaun Murphy, Stephen Maguire and Ali Carter. It
also featured a couple of players who were less successful.

In
fact, Day had already served notice of his potential by recovering from 4-0
down to beat Steve Davis 5-4 in the Welsh Open at Cardiff.

I
vaguely recall someone excitedly coming into the press room and declaring that
Day would ‘definitely be a world champion.’

I’ve
heard this said about so many players that the World Championship would have to
be played most weeks to make it possible.

It’s
the worst thing for a player to hear, particularly at a young age: it’s the
easiest thing for anyone to say but they don’t have to play the shots, endure
the pressure or cope with the burden of expectation.

Ryan
has had a very good career but a big title is missing. The good news is that
there is still time.

He
beat Ding 10-9 from 9-6 down at the Crucible last season, although his
quarter-final against Matthew Stevens saw him lose all eight frames of the
middle session. I was later told he had had a migraine before this session.

Today
he plays Neil Robertson in the International Championship in Chengdu. This
match is a good barometer of where Day is. If he can win or at least push
Robertson close with a strong performance it will bring back more confidence. A
heavy defeat would be a setback.

He’s
only 32 but there’s always a danger when a player drops out of the top 16 that
they aren’t quite going to get back.

26.10.12

Europe
has a growing legion of snooker fans but China has the money, lots of it. The
forthcoming International Championship in Chengdu carries a top prize of
£125,000, easily the highest ever awarded outside the UK.

China
is such a vast place that its cities are like countries within countries –
Chengdu has a population of around 14m – and they compete against each other.

This
is how Barry Hearn has been able to ink deals not just for five ranking events
there but also steadily increase the prize funds: none of the cities want to be
seen to be lagging behind.

We
live in a world of instant comment, much of it negative, but few could fault
the concept of this event. Aside from the prize fund it is being played over a
longer format in an era in which the mania is for shortening things.

Best
of elevens will be the order of the day in Chengdu with best of 17 semi-finals.

So
what to look out for?

Ronnie
O’Sullivan, the top seed, will play his first televised match in a ranking
event since he won his fourth world title last May.

Mark
Selby, hoping to remain world no.1, has a tough first round encounter in the
form of Ali Carter, who is close to returning to the top 16, with Masters
places up for grabs at the seedings revision which follows the tournament.

John
Higgins, who won the last full ranking event in Shanghai, will hope to
reproduce that form.

Ding
Junhui, whose China form is generally not too promising outside of Beijing,
will again be trying to shut out the expectations of a nation.

Mark
Allen, so brilliant in Belgium last week, reached Amsterdam with the wrong
passport and had to go back to Antrim to get the one which matched his visa.
Allen isn’t a fan of travelling but neither was John Parrott and he won
tournaments in all sorts of foreign climes.

Judd
Trump was beaten on the line by Higgins in Shanghai but can console himself
that he didn’t throw it away.

One
player due a win, if indeed anyone can be said to be, is Stephen Maguire.

He
came up just short in both the German Masters and China Open finals last season
and was a semi-finalist at the Crucible. Maguire has had success in PTCs and
has won in China before, in fact the 2008 China Open is his last full ranking
title.

Chengdu
is home to the giant panda. There are just 1,500 of these living in the world
and 80% are said to be in the Sichuan Province.

Snooker
was once a rarity in this part of the world. All that has changed. For European
viewers it means some early mornings but it also means another week of world
class action.

24.10.12

A
sign of how times have changed is that two televised events are now clashing.
As the new International Championship begins on Sunday, the World Seniors
Championship is coming to an end.

Seniors
snooker has never quite taken off, despite many attempts to establish it in the
same way as in golf and tennis.

There
was a tournament held in 1985 for all (living) former world champions called the
Kit-kat Break for world champions, one of the best names for a tournament ever.
Of course, many of these players were not seniors.

In
1991, Barry Hearn promoted a World Seniors Championship in which one great
character, Cliff Wilson, beat another, Eddie Charlton, 5-4.

In
1997, a Seniors Pot Black was held and shown on the BBC. Joe Johnson was the
winner.

In
2000, the Royal Automobile Club in London staged a seniors masters, won by
Willie Thorne.

But
the concept never really caught on. Part of the problem is that though many
people like to remember these older stars of snooker, they prefer to remember
them as they once were.

Ultimately
people go to tournaments to watch high quality action, not players who can’t
produce the form they once could.

Snooker
loves to go on about the ‘good old days.’

There
is a difference between nostalgia – the rosy-eyed romanticising of the past –
and heritage, which is a chronicling and respect for what has gone before.

Snooker
has for too long been nostalgic for years gone by without realising what it has
had at any given present.

In
the 1980s, the sport was made for late night highlights but many of these
largely tactical matches would frankly bore a generation brought up on the all
out attacking game.

Standards
have risen as the nature of how snooker is played has changed.

This
is not to do down the World Seniors Championship, but the event itself has a
somewhat confused format.

Nigel
Bond is the highest ranked player in the tournament and yet had to win three
matches to qualify while other players who haven’t played professionally for
years were seeded straight through.

Some
of these are world champions, which is fair enough, but others are not.

If
Sky is televising the event then certain concessions have to be made but a
shot-clock for these old stagers seems almost disrespectful.

Last
year, the rules were messed about with so much that there was a farcical
interlude in which the referee, John Williams, had to get them out of his
pocket and explain them to Steve Davis and John Parrott live on air.

I
think it’s right that matches are short early on but a world final should be
longer than a best of three.

These
are all opinions, not criticisms. I’m sure many will enjoy the tournament for
what it is. It’s a chance to see up close some of the players who helped make
snooker so popular on television.

But
perhaps the truth is this: modern snooker is now in such a strong state that we
no longer have to look to the past to reassure ourselves how good the game is.

18.10.12

Last
season’s PTC final in Belgium was one of the best matches of the whole season.
In an exhibition of flair, skill and entertainment, Judd Trump beat Ronnie O’Sullivan
4-3.

Snooker
returns to Antwerp this week for the latest event of the European Tour, the
first two of which have been won by Mark Selby and Neil Robertson respectively.
As ever in TV tournaments, the cream rises to the top.

Belgian
snooker fans will doubtless have high hopes for their young protégé, Luca
Brecel, whose run to the Crucible at the end of last season was evidence of his
great potential.

Belgium
is not a new market for snooker but it is one, like many others, which was
allowed to lie dormant for too long. The European Open was staged there several
times in the early 1990s.

It
would be nice to think that in the near future this tournament could return to
the schedule. Snooker is bubbling along very nicely in Europe but outside the
UK and not including the PTC finals there is only one ranking event, the German
Masters, on the continent.

This
is a first class tournament but is yet to attract the levels of sponsorship and
thus prize money available in China.

But
nobody can doubt the public interest in snooker around Europe. Belgium has a strong
cue sports tradition and surely anyone who had a ticket for last year’s final
will be back this season.

17.10.12

The
professional billiards season starts and ends this week with its only tournament,
the World Championship.

English
billiards has a long history. Mary Queen of Scots was such a fan of the game
that her body was wrapped in the cloth from her table following her execution.

Shakespeare
mentioned billiards in Anthony and Cleopatra. Variants of the game have spawned
a number of successful cue sports, most particularly snooker.

The
World Championship takes place at the Northern Snooker Centre in Leeds and has
attracted a record entry of 65 players from 15 countries.

It
is a joint promotion by World Billiards, the International Billiards and
Snooker Federation and the English Association for Snooker and Billiards and
comprises a timed event and 150-up competition.

Mike
Russell will be a great favourite having won a total of 16 world titles in
WPBSA and IBSF events.

Pankaj
Advani of India has decided to relinquish his place in snooker’s new
International Championship to play in Leeds.

Billiards
is a TV sport in India but attempts to televise it in the UK have usually
fallen flat.

In
the 1980s, Barry Hearn summed up what he saw as the essential problem with its
appeal: “Not enough balls.”

In
fact, the chief problem is that the top players are so skilful and timed
matches are frequently not close enough to be compelling. This is, after all, a
sport in which Tom Reece made a record break of 499,135 over a period of five
weeks in the early 20th century.

In
March 1987, the BBC did plan to show the World Championship extensively but
coverage was curtailed to make way for live news reports of the sinking of the
Herald of Free Enterprise.

Eurosport
shows much three cushion carom billiards, a different game entirely, not least
because the tables have no pockets.

Billiards
is a game of great skill and, as Advani has proved, can be a useful training
ground for snooker.

Its
profile has diminished down the years with the rise of snooker as a television
sport but without billiards there would be no snooker so I hope their World
Championship goes well.

12.10.12

The WPBSA has today suspended Stephen Lee from the professional circuit pending a hearing into alleged match fixing.

Their full statement reads:

On 2 October 2012 the Crown Prosecution Service announced that there will be no criminal proceedings in the match fixing allegations against Stephen Lee made in 2010. Following this decision by the CPS, the WPBSA started its own investigation into these allegations.

On 5 October 2012 the WPBSA met with the Gambling Commission in order to review material collected by the Gambling Commission which may prove relevant to the WPBSA investigation.

The WPBSA is now in the process of conducting a thorough enquiry into the circumstances and this will be led by Nigel Mawer, the Chairman of the WPBSA Disciplinary Committee.

On 12 October 2012, the WPBSA was informed of suspicious betting patterns relating to a game between Stephen Lee and John Higgins played on 11 October 2012. This suspicious activity has also been referred to Nigel Mawer, the Chairman of the WPBSA Disciplinary Committee.

The WPBSA have carefully considered both the initial information from the Gambling Commission which was reviewed on 5th October 2012 and the new information regarding suspicious betting patterns in relation to the match between Stephen Lee and John Higgins from 11 October 2012.

The WPBSA have concluded that it would not be appropriate for Stephen Lee to continue to compete on the World Snooker Tour whilst these investigations are undertaken and therefore WPBSA Chairman Jason Ferguson has taken the decision to suspend Stephen from competition whilst this enquiry is ongoing.

Subject to his right to appeal, this suspension will remain in place until either the conclusion of the investigation or any resultant hearings.

Lee, who turned 38 today, has won five world ranking titles, the most recent at the PTC Grand Finals last season.

He turned professional in 1992 and reached a career highest ranking of fifth.

11.10.12

Pankaj
Advani is a talented all round cueist, already a world champion at billiards
and in amateur snooker and now making his way in the professional ranks.

He
has qualified for the International Championship, alongside his fellow Indian,
Aditya Mehta.

Snooker
was invented in India but it has been in billiards where their cue sports
success has come.

And
it is billiards which is threatening to derail Advani's snooker progress. The World
Professional Championship in Leeds ends on the day the International
Championship in faraway Chengdu begins. Advani is due to play the following
evening but it would surely be a race against time were he to feature in the
billiards final, which could easily happen.

This
is an unfortunate dilemma for Advani but I imagine many players will see it
this way: if he had no intention of playing in the International Championship then
he shouldn’t have entered it. He has eliminated four players from the
tournament who would like to have played in the final stages.

If
he withdraws to play in the World Billiards Championship he will face
disciplinary action.

In
India, billiards is considered a more prestigious sport than snooker so his
country may expect him to prioritise the three-ball game. But Advani has
already been world champion in this sport, in 2009.

His
snooker career is just taking off. He played well to beat John Higgins at the
Paul Hunter Classic and can only now improve.

The
experience of playing in the final stages of a major ranking event would be
invaluable.

Advani
loves billiards but it isn’t a profession: they have only one tournament.
Snooker is and, as such, he could live to regret it if he decides not to go to
China.

EDIT: in fact, as commenters have pointed out, the Indian press have today reported that Advani has withdrawn from the International Championship to play in the billiards. Story here

9.10.12

Paul
Hunter died six years ago today. He was only 27. Next week he would have turned
34, still easily young enough to have been competing at the highest level.

We
all know about his career. He remains the youngest player to reach a ranking
event semi-final at just 16. He beat five top 16 players to win the Welsh Open
in 1998 at the age of 19.

He
won the Masters three times, all in deciding frame finishes after unlikely
comebacks.

He
won a total of three ranking titles, reached a high of fourth in the world
rankings and came within a frame of reaching the 2003 World Championship final.

These
facts should not be forgotten because they sum up a career which was already
successful and would surely have hit greater heights.

But
Paul was a player about whom people thought not of statistics but his more
human characteristics: he was always smiling, he was always determined to have
fun. When he won he did so without triumphalism. When he lost he did so
graciously without any bitterness.

He
was, in every sense, a personality, someone who drew people to snooker. Those
Masters finals were remarkable matches, not just through his recoveries but
because of how well he played to win them, centuries flying in, pressure balls
being dispatched, his nerve remaining firm to the end.

If
Ray Reardon, who I wrote about yesterday, was one of those who lit the snooker
fuse in the public mind, Paul was one of the main reasons it kept burning amid
gross mismanagement and lost opportunities.

His
cancer diagnosis came shortly before the 2005 China Open, a tournament now
remembered for sparking the current snooker boom in China, due to Ding Junhui
winning it at the age of 18.

Paul
still travelled to Beijing to play, obviously deeply concerned about his
future. The press knew he was ill but did not know the severity of his
condition at this point.

After
he won his first match we requested him for an interview. This can take quite a
long time in China because various people want a piece of the player but a good
20-30 minutes passed with no sign of Paul.

We
assumed he had left the building, and quite possibly cursed him for it. Someone
went off to see what had happened and found him still in the arena, patiently signing
autographs for fans.

Paul
wasn’t a saint but he had a genuine goodness, recognised by snooker fans the
world over.

8.10.12

Ray
Reardon has today turned 80, a grand age for a grand man of snooker.

Reardon
was one of snooker’s first TV stars, a formidable figure with jet-black hair
and a widow’s peak which led him to be nicknamed ‘Dracula.’

It
was apt for one of the game’s toughest match-players, a man with a seemingly
endless resolve and very definite killer instinct.

Reardon
was born on this day in 1932, between the two world wars, in Tredegar, a coal
mining town in Wales.

The
son of a miner, at the age of 14 he was down a pit where he was buried for
several hours in a rockfall. After this, he knew mining wasn’t for him.

The
Reardon family relocated to Stoke where he would eventually become a policeman,
pounding the streets as a bobby but already dreaming of snooker glory.

Already
Welsh amateur champion, Reardon almost won the 1956 English amateur title. He
led Tommy Gordon 7-3 in the final at the end of the first day’s play but, with
his first shot of the second, his tip flew off and he lost 11-9.

This
was unfortunate but Reardon had always been savvy. When he met John Spencer,
who would go on to be a great rival but never a close friend, in the English
amateur final in 1964 the organisers asked each to send a photograph for the tournament
programme.

Reardon
duly sent off a picture of him wearing his snooker gear, looking a million
dollars. Spencer, far more naive, sent the first photo he could find, which was
him in swimming trunks.

Reardon
won 11-8 and a few years later he turned professional, though this was not then
the door to riches it later became.

It
was hard work: flogging around the fledgling exhibition circuit in holiday
camps of the UK, demand increasing due to a programme on the BBC’s new colour
TV service. Pot Black would change everything.

Now,
players were recognised. The World Championship reverted to knock-out format
after several years as a series of challenge matches. Reardon lost 25-24 to
Fred Davis in the first round in 1969 but beat Davis, Spencer and, in the
final, John Pulman 37-33 a year later.

As
world champion his profile rose and he could supplement his tournament
earnings, such as they were, with a steady income in exhibitions.

Reardon
had the mindset to dominate. He was determined but he was also acutely aware of
the importance of psychology in snooker. He knew when he had an opponent on the
ropes. Like his alter ego, he knew when to plunge his teeth into their necks - figuratively speaking - and not stop until they were finished.

Reardon
won six world titles in the 1970s as the game grew into a professional sport
with television interest rapidly increasing.

Perhaps
his greatest of these came in 1975 at the Nunawading Basketball Stadium,
Australia, where he recovered from 29-24 down to beat home favourite Eddie
Charlton 31-30 in the final.

Reardon’s
Crucible success of 1978 at the age of 45 was his last in the World
Championship, although he reached the final again in 1982, losing only 18-15 to
Alex Higgins. His last Crucible appearance came in 1987.

He
had been snooker’s first world no.1 in 1976 and that year won the Masters
and several other titles, although he had far fewer tournaments in which to
play in his heyday compared to those top players who followed in his wake.

Reardon
was still playing to a high standard into his 50s. He is the oldest ever
ranking event winner, capturing the 1982 Professional Players Tournament at 50.

In
1988, he whitewashed the then imperious Steve Davis 5-0 in the British Open at Derby.

But
Reardon’s eyesight was failing. He never took to spectacles and tried contact
lenses. At the qualifiers he wore a visor to cut out the glare of the lights.

His
career declined and, a proud competitor, he retired from tournament play in
1991.

Like
most players who have drifted into snooker politics, Reardon’s board membership
did not end well. He got mixed up in the Rex Williams regime at the end of the
1990s, which ultimately culminated in him and Williams being expelled from the
WPBSA, although they were later reinstated.

I
got to know him a little at around this time and found him to be both charming
and eccentric. He was full of old stories, such as how Alex Higgins was drunk
for at least three sessions of their 1976 world final, but also seemed
interested in the modern game.

In
2004, Reardon was asked by Ronnie O’Sullivan’s father to give his son some
advice. The two clicked and Reardon was in O’Sullivan’s corner when he won his
second world title.

These
days, Reardon is happily retired in Devon. He enjoys good food, wine and golf,
a nice lifestyle which may explain why he is so well preserved.

Reardon
is a name evocative of snooker’s first flowerings as a television
entertainment.

Before
Steve Davis, Stephen Hendry, Ronnie O’Sullivan and John Higgins, he was top
dog, the man to beat, the player everyone else wanted to be.

Like
those other early players he helped foster the interest in snooker which led to the
professional circuit as we know it.

For
this, and his great record of achievement, we should wish him a very happy
birthday.

6.10.12

Neil
Robertson won the match of the day at the Gdynia Open yesterday, recovering
from 3-1 down to beat Jamie Jones 4-3.

It
was a reminder of why the top players are the top players. It’s nothing to do
with ‘the system’ but the fact that they so frequently produce their best
snooker when they have to.

The
key to Robertson’s success is not only his ability but his personality. He’s
not a moaner. His glass isn’t half empty, in fact it’s not half full: it’s full
to the brim. He always accentuates the positive and reaps the rewards from this
mindset.

He
won in Poland last year, surviving four successive deciding frame finishes
before capturing the PTC in Warsaw.

Robertson
now plays Martin Gould, already a PTC winner this season.

His
good friend Joe Perry seems to be going through a purple patch. Fresh from his
quarter-final appearance at the Shanghai Masters, Perry yesterday defeated Mark
Davis 4-1 and now faces Stephen Maguire.

Rod
Lawler has proved that it’s never too late to win a professional title. Perry
is certainly good enough, it’s just that so many other players are also good
enough.

Jimmy
White’s match with Dave Harold was not a classic but White's supporters will be
cheered by his progress. He now faces Liang Wenbo, whose own form was hard to
discern because his opponent, Andy Hicks, struggled about as badly as it is
possible to struggle.

The
final match of the last 32 kicks off this morning with John Higgins, who played
so well in Shanghai, facing Ding Junhui, a player whose performances are
becoming increasingly hard to predict.

Ticket
sales for the weekend are said to be very strong in this latest outpost to
embrace snooker.

5.10.12

We
don’t get to see James Warren White on television much these days so the
Whirlwind’s many fans will look forward to his match this afternoon against
Dave Harold in the Gdynia Open.

White
is still plugging away but is now 50 so if his snooker career were a frame he’d
be down to the colours.

His
supporters have a store of memories to recall, many of them moments they would
rather forget. Being a White fan is an emotional rollercoaster, never more so
than during his matches at the Crucible.

To
reach six world finals is a great achievement, one that only Steve Davis and
Stephen Hendry can better at the Crucible. But, of course, White never won one.

He
did win the Masters and the UK Championship, two Irish Masters and ten ranking
titles, but – rightly or wrongly – these seem to play second fiddle in the
public conscious to his defeats in the world final.

But
Jimmy is nothing if not stoic. He still loves snooker and continues to breeze
around the exhibition circuit, where he produces the goods away from the glare
of the TV lights.

Recently,
when he has played on TV he has looked a little nervous. It used to be second
nature to him but he now spends most of his playing time in the cubicles of the
qualifiers.

I
thought he played well against Judd Trump at last season’s China Open and he
has every chance of having a good weekend in Poland.

Whether
he does or not, his army of fans will be anxiously following every ball as
ever, hoping for one more golden memory from this most popular of players.

4.10.12

Hala Sportowo-Widowiskowa is the
roll-off-the-tongue venue for the Gdynia Open, event two of the Betfair European
Tour which, to complicate matters further, is also part of the Players Tour
Championship.

The idea for the European Tour is to build up a series of events across Europe into big tournaments.

Those
who snipe at Eurosport would do well to realise that there would be no European
Tour without the channel. There would be no German Masters either.

When
television viewers see snooker, large numbers want to watch it. They become
fans.

What’s
refreshing in Europe is that they have only started watching snooker in the
last few years and so are fans of the game as it is now rather than endlessly
harking back to the ‘golden days’ where the sun always shone, you could leave
your front door open and Tony Meo was always on the TV.

The
Gdynia Open has already been played down to 32 players and it’s a good mix of
big names, a few old stagers and some newer faces.

On
paper, the match of the first round pits John Higgins, fresh from his
remarkable Shanghai Masters triumph, against Ding Junhui, who in Poland will
not have the forbidding pressure of home expectation.

Higgins
and Ding are among a number of big hitters making the trip to Poland. Other
favourites for the title include Mark Selby, who won ET1, Stephen Maguire, Neil
Robertson, Stuart Bingham and Graeme Dott.

It’s
also a chance for some of those lower down the rankings to show us what they
can do.

Michael
Wasley is a first season professional from Gloucester who will face Maguire
live on television in the last 32.

This
is what it’s all been about for players such as Wasley: all the hours of
practice, all the preparation.

Players
feel like proper professionals when they play on TV. It’s a shop window in
which they can showcase their considerable skills.

Michael
will I’m sure receive the usual advice: enjoy the experience, you have nothing
to lose.

In
fact, he has a match to lose, and nobody enjoys the experience of losing. But
it’s a learning curve for him either way. If he wins it’s a career high, if he
loses he can examine what went wrong later on video (do people still watch
videos?).

Good
luck to him and all the rest. For Polish snooker fans this is a once-a-year
chance to see professional snooker up close.

3.10.12

One
of Britain’s best known snooker clubs, Willie Thorne’s in Leicester, closed
yesterday after 32 years.

The
reason given is that the council need the building for office space. A council
spokesman told the Leicester Mercury: "The lease for the snooker hall was
sold by Willie Thorne some years ago and the current operators have never
signed a lease.

"We
gave them notice we would be ending their tenancy and they have accepted this. We
own the building and already have some offices there. We are looking at the
options for using the rest of it foroffice accommodation but no plans have
yet been drawn up."

The
current operators are Rileys, who own a number of snooker clubs in the UK.

Regardless
of the reasons, the closure of WT’s is symbolic of the downturn in interest in
the game in the UK.

People
often talk of the extraordinary viewing figures snooker achieved on British TV
in the 1980s but participation levels were also huge. Children all around the
country were getting small snooker tables as Christmas presents, including a 12
year-old Stephen Hendry. It was a game that could not be ignored. But times
change.

WT’s
was an iconic club because it was widely used for tournaments, particularly for
juniors.

Most
professionals of the last 30 years passed through its doors dreaming of one day
emulating their heroes in the professional ranks.

This
was long before players complained snooker was getting in the way of their social
life: this was their social life. It was Saturday mornings on the motorway,
obliging parents shipping young hopefuls to junior events.

It was a generation of boys whose enthusiasm for snooker knew no bounds.

It
was here that friendships and rivalries formed which still stand to this day.
It was here that young talent was nurtured, most particularly by Malcolm
Thorne, Willie’s brother, an unsung hero in the development of many careers.

Mark
Selby was one of them. He said: “It’s a sad day because I wouldn't be where I
was without Willie Thorne's. I played there from the age of 11 to 16 and
Willie's brother, Malcolm, let me practice for free and he sponsored me in my
first competitions. I have a lot of great memories of the
club.”

The
snooker boom of the 1980s on British television led to an explosion in clubs
but in recent years many have closed.

This
is because of a number of reasons. Honeymoons don’t last forever. Snooker was
the in thing for many years but fashions change.

The
smoking ban hit the sport hard. Snooker clubs are not just about snooker but are
social hubs. Many enjoyed going in for a chat and a smoke and a drink and,
maybe, a few frames as well.

But
the game has also gradually disappeared from mainstream TV.

When
I was a kid in the 1980s there were as many as nine tournaments on terrestrial
television. Now there are three, and they do not receive the terrestrial hours
they used to.

Just
yesterday the BBC announced it was reducing its red button output to only one
channel from later this month. This means for its snooker tournaments the most
it can show is one table and, at times, there won’t even be that.

All
of the above has a knock-on effect. Wales has always been a stronghold for the
sport but just recently the snooker hall at Pontardawe Arts Centre was threatened
with closure.

Why?
Because its takings from five tables had fallen from £24,000 to just £2,000.
The number of people using the tables has fallen from 18,600 to 1,600.

Snooker
is no longer a game large numbers of British kids want to play.

Some
still do, obviously. But junior events simply do not attract the same numbers
they once did.

Readers
from elsewhere in the world may well say, ‘so what?’ The Brits have had it too
good for too long. The qualifying set-up is still based in the UK and the
circuit has long been biased towards British players.

This
is true but it is because of the demand in Britain for snooker. As that demand
declines, what of the future?

1.10.12

Oliver
Lines won the first qualifying event of the Snookerbacker Classic at the
weekend, an event which culminates in its two finalists having their entries
paid for Q School.

Lines
is the 17 year-old son of Peter Lines, a professional from Leeds, which is
where the event was held.

Time
flies. I remember Peter talking about his then very young son when he made his
Crucible appearance in 1998.

Oliver
was into football in a big way but has decided to try and emulate his father by
becoming a professional.

This
remains relatively rare in snooker, whereas it is more commonplace in some
other sports, such as cricket.

For
instance, Chris Cowdrey, son of the great Colin Cowdrey, was briefly England
captain during a calamitous summer in which the national side had four
captains.

Snooker’s
best known father and son remain Geoff and Neal Foulds. They played each other in a couple of tournaments, not a nice situation for either who would usually
be supporting the other.

More
latterly, Steve Davis’s son, Greg, entered Q School. Steve himself was tutored
in the ways of snooker by his own father, Bill.

But
it’s very hard for the sons of really successful players to make any sort of
impact themselves, as their careers will always be compared to that of their
celebrated fathers.

Blaine
Hendry, son of Stephen, has played as a junior but it would be difficult for
him to make a snooker career in his own right.

Alex
Higgins started the now well worn trend of bringing babies and children into
the arena at the end of major victories. These youngsters will always be known
as the offspring of famous fathers regardless of what they do with their lives.

So
to follow them into the same profession is perhaps a further diminishing of
their own identities.

Peter
Lines has been a very solid pro, a UK Championship quarter-finalist, but not a
major title winner. So Oliver, if he does make it on to the tour, has a chance to
shine without being known just as ‘son of...’